Breakfast in the gamekeeper’s cottage was a more elaborate affair, involving a clean tablecloth and a big teapot with a pattern of flowers on it, matching plates, piles of toast and two boiled eggs each. Dan made the breakfast while his father was outside feeding the chickens and ducks and collecting their eggs.

Mrs Glass had died five years ago and the older children, two boys and a girl, had left home. One boy was a forester on a big estate in Yorkshire, one who had a mechanical bent had gone to work in the Morris factory in Oxford and was living in lodgings there. The girl was in service near Bicester. Mrs Glass’s married sister who lived in the village and whose children were old enough almost to look after themselves, came three times a week to clean the house, do the washing and leave something cooked for them. This she did in return for eggs and vegetables and a good share of the game with which Glass as one of the perquisites of his job was plentifully provided. Otherwise the two of them looked after themselves and Dan was as neat and methodical about the housework as he was about his botanical drawings and his notes on natural history.

These last had become a point of contention between Glass and Sir Randolph. (Dan, though not indifferent in the matter, was undecided as to which side to take.) It had all been started by Cicely, who a year ago when Dan had still been at school had seen one of his Nature Notebooks there. Minnie was always happy to let someone else take over her duties in the village. Whenever they were at Nettleby, Ida and her daughter did most of the visiting which Minnie in fact, though no one would have guessed it from her manner, found a bore. Cicely went to the school one day, was shown the children’s work, and came back much impressed by Dan Glass’s skill. Sir Randolph asked to see some of the notebooks and when Dan left school and was taken on as an assistant under-keeper to work with his father (at a yearly wage of £20), Sir Randolph, whose interest in the boy had been aroused, soon came to the conclusion that although he would undoubtedly in due course become a very good gamekeeper, there was something not only about the skilful methodical drawings and notes which he still kept in a succession of notebooks, but about his cautious attitude towards his observations which seemed to Sir Randolph genuinely scientific in spirit. He thought it would be a pity if this aptitude were to be left without further training, and offered to finance Dan’s education. He suggested a grammar school in Oxford – could he not board with his brother the mechanic? – and held out the hope of University. Glass, embarrassed and finding it difficult to explain why he felt so strongly opposed to the idea, had so far politely but firmly rejected it. Dan did not know what to think. He was perfectly content with his life as it was, but to work on the subject which seemed to him more interesting than anything in the world with other people who felt the same would obviously be wonderful. On the other hand, the prospect of more school seemed less wonderful, and he did not want to leave his father. He was as yet a stranger to worldly ambition, except in the sort of dream-like way which requires no action. The question stayed in the air. Glass had said no, but his conscience nagged him. Sir Randolph insisted the offer was still open. Dan tried to forget about it, expecting that Providence must surely speak, one way or the other.